Lisa Kudrow has moved on, with a smart new series of her sitcom about the perils of fame. But she’ll never forget where she came from, as James Rampton reports

Even though se moved on, Lisa Kudrow will never forget where she came from

Lisa Kudrow is just how you’d expect her to be. We’re meeting at an up-market hotel in Beverly Hills, on opposite sides of a wide boardroom table, but this is not a scary Apprentice-style experience. Instead, she is welcoming, warm and witty.

Dressed in a dark suit that offsets her shiny blonde hair and flawless complexion, she could easily pass for two decades younger than her 51 years, and it’s easy to see why she once made the 50 Most Beautiful list in People magazine.

She also has a keen sense of humour. When it’s put to her that her acting is so naturalistic it appears improvised, she responds, “That’s because I look like I don’t know what I’m doing!”

Lisa, who grew up in Los Angeles, the daughter of a doctor and a travel agent, is the youngest of three siblings. She is appealingly self-deprecating and dismisses the notion she was the funniest person in the household when growing up.

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“People still see me as Phoebe, but that’s no problem. She was a lovely person to be for 10 years"

When you really experience that attention and everyone cares what you’re doing and wants pictures of you, it doesn’t feel like a warm hug.

Lisa Kudrow

“My whole family is very funny,” she says. “In fact, I would steal their stuff and take it to school to make people laugh.”

She’s still making us laugh, although the material is now definitely her own. In The Comeback, the comedy-drama she co-created and which is returning after a nine-year hiatus, she plays has-been comedy actress Valerie Cherish, a woman so desperate to cling to fame that she subjects herself to a humiliating reality TV show.

It’s a smart take on the downside of celebrity – but then no one understands fame better than Lisa, thanks to 10 seasons as the perennially ditsy Phoebe in Friends, a show that is still reckoned to be on TV somewhere in the world every second of the day.

“People still see me as Phoebe, but that’s no problem,” says Lisa. “She was a lovely person to be for 10 years. I’m not expecting any other role I play to change people’s minds about who I am because that would be fruitless.”

Lisa, who also has film credits in movies such as The Opposite of Sex and Analyze This and is executive producer of the US version of Who Do You Think You Are?, has no regrets about her continuing association with Friends.

“It was the best experience, and an unusually good one in TV,” she says. “We all got along, the producers were great and it was wonderful being involved. I was extraordinarily lucky.”

So why did the main six Friends cast – herself and Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Matthew Perry, Matt LeBlanc and David Schwimmer – get along so well?

“Normally there’s a code with actors,” Lisa says. “We don’t give each other notes under any circumstances and we don’t comment on each other’s performances.

“But Courteney was giving us permission to give her notes and we agreed it would be great if we all did that. Why not? She was the one who set that tone and made us a real group who were completely open and honest with each other. I think that was the turning point.”

Lisa, who has been married to French advertising executive Michel Stern for 20 years and has one son, 16-year-old Julian, also admits that fame comes at a price.

“Before you’re well known, you think, ‘Oh, if you’re famous, you’re loved and adored,’” she says. “Then, when you really experience that attention and everyone cares what you’re doing and wants pictures of you, it doesn’t feel like a warm hug.

It feels like an assault.”There are compensations, of course. The six stars of Friends each secured a $1 million-per-episode deal for the final two years of the series’ run, making the three women the highest-paid TV actresses of all time.

But not everyone in showbiz hits the jackpot and Lisa’s take on the less desirable side of celebrity informs every minute of The Comeback, which she co-writes and produces with a former executive producer of Sex and the City.

The first series aired in 2005 but Lisa was moved to consider a revival, now that the concept is more topical than ever. With the rise of such programmes as Keeping Up with the Kardashians and The Real Housewives of Orange County, the idea of a celebrity opening up every aspect of her life – from therapy to bikini waxing – to public scrutiny in a TV reality show has now gone from fiction to fact.

“One of the things I like about The Comeback is that it asks the question, ‘Who are you in your own head and what are you presenting to the world?’” says Lisa. “And that’s still very much a part of the show.”

So what does the future hold? More sitcoms? More film roles?

“Well,” says Lisa. “I think I’m going to get people saying, ‘You look like you could be Phoebe’s mother.’ That’s coming soon!”